Turkey

In an effort to have Noah "play with his food", we attempted to give our little Stink Pot a turkey leg on Thanksgiving. At first he looked at it with an inquiring eye. Once he grabbed the leg, however, he instantly knew it was FOOD. EEK!Get that thing away from me! That made Daddy-O and Papa secretly very happy!

Ten Months

Noah turned ten months old today. Taking his picture this month was a bit of a challenge. Noah was quite fascinated with Ryan Bear and felt the need to grab it, hug it, put it over his knee, and give it loads of kisses. Kc took almost 70 pictures and there were only a few of our little Stink Pot sitting nicely. Noah's stats this month are:

Weight: 23 pounds 4 ounces
Length: 30 inches

I'm just sitting so nicely...clapping my hands...looking at Daddy-O.
Where did you come from?
I LOVE you Ryan Bear!
What? I'm not touching anything!

Happy Thanksgiving

According to Noah's G-Tube button, Mr. Turkey is done.* Have a very Happy Thanksgiving!


*No babies were harmed in the making of this post.

Giving Thanks

I have so much to be thankful for this year. Let me see if I can begin to give thanks for all that I have..

1. A loving God who is bigger that I can fathom, loves me more than I can possibly imagine, and has an awesome plan for my life.
2. The most amazing husband ever who takes out the trash, listens when I talk endlessly about work and my kiddos, buys me flowers for "no special reason", always puts his family before work, and is the greatest Daddy-O ever!!!
   
3. The cutest little Stink Pot (AKA Noah) a Mama could ask for who is smiley, opinionated, cuddly, laid back, curious and most of all a fighter.
4. The most supportive parents, siblings and sisters-in-law who always encourage me, lift me up, appreciate the necessity of tradition, and continually make me laugh (mostly with them, but occasionally at them).
5. The greatest in-laws who ask questions, make special trips to visit us, and raised my husband to be an amazing Man of God.
6. The awesome women in my life who love me, laugh and cry with me, share their mommy stories with me, and let me know that I'm never alone.
   
7. The craziest co-workers and bosses who truly do believe that "We Are Family"!
8. The greatest set of doctors who are patient to answer all my questions, treat my little guy with loving hands, and are fighting so hard for him.
9. The roof over my head, food in my pantry, clothes in my closet, and breath in my lungs.

I hope your Thanksgiving is full of turkey, laughter and love.

Play with Your Food

Noah met with a new Occupational Therapist on Wednesday. She did a two hour evaluation on his oral and fine motor skills. She gave us several exercises to do with Noah's face to help build strength in his muscles as well as told us that Noah needs to, "play with his food every day". Well, OK. Here we go...Noah's not sure what he thinks about chicken and rice.Notice how Mama strategically coordinated Noah's shirt color with the color of his food.This whole food thing might not be all that bad.

New Hat

What do you do with an empty 2 x 2 box (the gauze squares that go under his trach)? You put it on your head, of course.I'm just the coolest thing around!

Sad Day

Yes...it was a very sad day. We officially had to move Noah Man out of his infant car seat into a toddler car seat. He reached the height and weight limits a few weeks ago and we unfortunately had to move on.

If that wasn't the worst, we also had to say good-bye to Noah's stroller. If one can have a love affair with a stroller, I definitely had one with this Maclaren.It is a stroller base that the car seat just sits upon. It has an incredibly HUGE basket underneath that was able to hold Noah's suction machine, apnea monitor, extra trachs, extra trach supplies, G-Tube supplies, medication, food, etc. One could honestly fit a small country in the basket of this stroller. The greatest part about this stroller was that it folded up into a small, compact, umbrella-like fold that was so easy to move in and out of the car. If I could have folded Noah up and crammed him into his old car seat, I would have just to keep the old stroller. But, alas, I did have to say good-bye. Tears!

Noah's new stroller is...nice. No, it really is. It has enough storage to hold the things we need. It reclines so he can nap. It is not too heavy. It folds up relatively small. It allows my little man to see the world, which he just loves. I like my new stroller. I do. Really I do.
Perhaps if I say it enough, I might actually believe it.

Yeah!

Noah began clapping several weeks ago. He thinks it is quite funny. Initially, he would clap with two fists. Recently, he started to open one hand and clap the other fist. Today, we were able to capture his first clapping with two open hands. So cool!

And yes, our bed is normally made, but this morning was one of those crazy mornings.

Nine Months

So...things in the Jackson house have been CRAZY to say the least. In the past two weeks we've had: a leak in the roof which flooded the garage and laundry room requiring all new drywall, all of the treasures from our garage temporarily moved into our living room, three flu shots that have not been well received, five doctors appointments, one scheduled CT scan that Noah would not lie still enough for even though he was sedated, 23 parent-teacher conferences that Mama had to do, one case of pink-eye for Noah Man and now Mama has strep throat and is wearing a surgical mask so as not to "share" her germs. Needless to say, we're ready for a change of pace.

Other than the pink-eye, Mr. Man continues to do very well. He is rolling all over and transfers objects back and forth from one hand to the other. He is not very interested in crawling, however, even though both of his physical therapists are working on it. At his nine month check-up his stats were:

Weight: 22 pounds 11 ounces
Height: 29 inches

He is now in the the 70th percentile. Way to go little man!

We're looking forward to a nice relaxing weekend. We'll see if that actually happens.